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When Malware Authors Combine Efforts
An anonymous reader writes "Spammers, Hackers and virus writers are all teaming up according to some russian security researchers. This means that they reckon that weaknesses will be exploited in a matter of hours of being announced, rather thant the weeks and months that we're seeing now.
Scary stuff."
They couldn't get along!
So where does this place public disclosure advocates? Are people going to demand that makers of affected software have a 24/7 programming staff ready to plug leaks just so weakenesses can de disclosed immedately? In light of this even I would favor not publicly disclosing weaknesses immediately!
...make deep bugs deeper. FOSS philosophy applied to viruses. Yikes.
adam b.
Isn't this the same as orginized crime. So a bunch of internet thugs orginize to advertise more stuff, because they realized it will be more effective if they worked togeth. Will this rise the cost of protection money to use the internet?
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Used to be (way back in 2003 or so) AdAware was all you needed (and Norton AV or a workalike)
But now, man some of the things I've seen are really nasty!
You wipe 'em out, they come back, they hide from searches, morph into other programs, I've even seen one (I shit you not, I've been in IT for 10+ years, never seen anything like this one!) that was active even when the infected drive was placed as a slave on another machine, it started right up and infected the new PC.
This goes way beyond simple syware, these people are teaming up and it's just the beginning.
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
"They work in groups that exchange information with other groups on forums and Web sites."
erhmm....
ianase (i am not a security expert) but wouldn't that statement apply to, hmmmm....., oh i don't know.....THE INTERNET?? seriously, a broad, vague, statement like that suggests to me that this is mostly overreaction on the part of a group who could experience significant gains IF their statements were true.
fud? imho, yes.
The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.
-Oscar Wilde
Kinda makes you think twice about publicly announcing vulnerabilities in your software before you have time to fix them, does it not?
There's a Mercedes gap too. I want one and can't afford one, but it's not government's job to do anything about it.
This circumstance does have some advantages; by tying themselves together financially they open the possibility for one to be traced from the other.
It also opens the participants to criminal conspiracy charges. Can you say RICO, motherf***er?
1) spread fear, its good for business. ... We need to cooperate to prevent this.")
2) create some fucked up 'axis of evil' shit to help further #1. ("Virus writers are combining their efforts with hackers and spammers to launch Swiss Army knife-like malware attacks on users")
3) throw in some fuzzy math for effect. ("The company said that it was seeing 200 new viruses a day.")
4) take a random stab at preventing free speech. ( "They work in groups that exchange information with other groups on forums and Web sites
5) and finally, say something really stupid that goes against something tried and true thats trusted in the industry - in this case, the idea of Full Disclosure. ("We are against anyone who publishes vulnerabilities because it gives hackers a tool.")
and to think i actually used to respect their work. maybe they should just stick to coding and save the PSA's for when they have a smarter PR rep.
just my 2 cents.
smattawichu
I see a major problem with this, at least in some circumstances. If businesses start issuing too many warnings about vulnerabilities, at least some users might become "desensitized" to the urgent need to upgrade. Heck, already too many users don't bother upgrading until there's a big bad virus or worm out there threatening everyone.
Of course, by the same token, if businesses start issuing more warnings (cough*MICROSOFT*cough*) then maybe more people will realize that their software of choice is a piece of sh*t and start looking for a replacement.
I think that so far, the general effect of an increased emphasis on security has been the latter (people reconsidering options). But will it always stay that way? I don't know.
Close. Actually, the two things you should do are:
1) Download and install Firefox.
2) Delete Internet Explorer (if you can).
On my computer, Internet Explorer is slightly faster for casual browsing than FireFox because Explorer is more tightly integrated into the operating system.
On my computer, I'm running Linux. IE is NOT integrated into the operating system. You can't see it, but I'm doing the Superior Dance.
If IE is integrated into your OS, there is a third thing you should do.
3) Upgrade to Linux or Mac.
I can't understand why everyone isn't more enraged by the fact that 80% of spam now comes from zombie Windows PCs. Lack of security hurts us all. As a society, we're far too complacent about PC security. We should take the attitude that a person's right to run an unpatched Windows box attached to a high speed cable ISP does not supercede the right of a million internet users not to drown in illegal V1aGr@ and warez spam.
>> My ultraviolent Linux switch video.